


War is Over! (If You Want It)

by warmommy



Category: Inglourious Basterds (2009)
Genre: F/M, Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-02
Updated: 2018-01-02
Packaged: 2019-02-27 08:53:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13244799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/warmommy/pseuds/warmommy
Summary: Tumblr request prompt fill: "Can I hold your hand?"The war is over, and you have a hard time envisioning yourself as the hero the papers make you out to be. You also can't picture a life without the Basterds.





	War is Over! (If You Want It)

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! You can find this and a lot more at my tumblr, warmommy.tumblr.com!

It was over. The newspaper headlines all announced Germany’s surrender to the Allied forces. They were passed around the hospital ward, some of them German, some of them French, some even in Russian. All the same happiness and cheer, people crying, strangers holding each other in the streets, and your name was in every article.

Yours and theirs.

And you didn’t even deserve it.

While the theatre exploded with Donny and Omar still inside, you had been in surgery, far from the action. You hadn’t been captured, like Hirschberg, Utivich, and Lieutenant, and helped to negotiate the end of the biggest war the world had ever seen. 

Stiglitz had only been winged in that fucking tavern firefight, so he had actually helped the backup unit load you, Hicox, and Wicki into a stolen ambulance. He’d refused treatment of his own for a while, and that was sort of touching, really. It was the hospital staff that had told you about it, not Hugo himself. He worked so hard, in spite of his own injuries, to save the lives of people he rarely even spoke to. 

Stiglitz was also your most frequent visitor, in the beginning. His arm in a sling, he would come and sit next to your bed with, and you still had no idea  _how_  he’d gotten them, but German ladies’ magazines, and he’d read aloud from them until you begged him to stop. Then he hit you with them. 

He also kept you updated on the progress of Hicox and Wicki. Hugo decidedly despised Archie Hicox and considered him at fault for the entire debacle, so it was more Wicki than Hicox. You hadn’t even known, not for days, that Hugo was lying about Archie being in a coma. It was Wicki who’d told you about that on his first visit.

You’d nearly cried when you saw him, and didn’t quite understand why that was. After the tavern firefight, you’d been lying amongst the bodies convinced of your own death and the deaths of those that you cared about. In your own way, you loved Stiglitz, and, in whatever outer space way of his own, he loved you. That connection just paled in comparison to you and Wicki.

Maybe it was because you’d known each other longer. Maybe it was just because you’d been knackered on whatever drugs for days. Maybe it was seeing him okay, maybe it was seeing him practically head to foot in bandages, holding out a pack of cigarettes because he knew you needed them. 

When you were able to get up and move more, you visited him, too. You were there and a part of each other’s recovery process. One of the higher ups informed you that you and the other Basterds were going to be taken to Washington to meet up with the rest and receive Congressional Medals of Honor. Landa really had pulled out all the damn stops, hadn’t he? Probably to make sure none of you would go after him later on. Stiglitz had full citizenship waiting for him, all of you would be taken care of for life. 

Heroes. That’s what they said.

It still just did not set with you. 

“Hey!”

You looked up from the bench where you sat, then stood, realising who was speaking to you. “There you are. Have you packed?”

“Packed what, my crutches?” Wicki laughed and shook his head. “Hirschberg took our packs, they’re waiting for us at the depot. When are we boarding?”

You scoffed and motioned for him to sit with you. “No one knows where Hugo is, so they’re tracking him down. I’m actually a little afraid he’s been killing people again.”

“What, Nazis?” Wicki tilted his head.

“Well, yeah, of course Nazis, but we have  _no_ authorisation for that anymore, and I doubt we ever technically had it for him, because I’m not sure to what extent the OSS  _knew_  about him traveling with us.” You sighed heavily and tried to put it out of mind. “Well, this is it. We’re going home.”

“Aren’t you happy? We get to adopt Stiglitz and raise him like our own and everything.” Wicki asked. 

“No.” The painkillers they gave you to take, the codeine, it made your tongue a little looser than it normally would be. “I’ve lived with you guys for four years. I have no idea what the fuck I’m going to do with myself.”

“Well, yeah, it’s an adjustment.”

“It’s boring.” You laughed joylessly down at your knees. “What am I supposed to do without you, Wicki?”

It was quiet for a while. Probably, you’d made him uncomfortable. You felt too bad for yourself to really even care.

Wicki slotted his arm around you and leaned against your shoulder. “You say that like you ever had a chance in hell of getting away from me, man.”

Now, the laughter was real, albeit soft. “Not for nothing, Wick, but I’ll miss you most.”

Wicki shifted and cleared his throat. “Uh, not for nothing, Y/N, but, uh. . .Can I. . .hold your hand?”

You agreed. He was still holding your hand when Hugo finally showed up, wild-eyed and ready to go. He was still holding your hand when you boarded your flight. First stop, New York. 

Wicki squeezed your hand in his and pointed down at the Statue of Liberty, and he told you with excited tones how he’d been moved to tears the first time he’d seen her, because it meant he’d finally gotten away, he and his parents and siblings would be safe. You looked at him and saw that his eyes were glassy now, too. 

“We’re all safe, now,” you whispered, holding his hand even tighter.

“I spent a whole lotta time these past few years wondering what it would be like when I knew  _you_ would be safe from now on,” Wicki said quietly. When you turned back toward him, away from the window, he leaned in and kissed you.

Across the way, your drunk, German ward began to applaud.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! You can find this and a lot more at my tumblr, warmommy.tumblr.com!


End file.
